View    Log in    Register

Home Editor's Desk Products Information Center About Us Contact Us

 

Review Quick Reference:

Product names:
Car2U Garage Door Converter,
Key Chain Remote,
Wireless Gateway Module.
Vendor: Wayne Dalton
www.wayne-dalton.com

 

Rants and Raves:

Rants: Some of installation took longer than it should have — some was user error, some was unclear direction on the illustration in the documentation. I also needed to dig up the original manual for my garage door opener (not the fault of the products, however) but that did add to the time it took to complete the installation.

Raves: The documentation is great but it’s critical to follow it to the letter. The three products all worked as they were supposed to once installed and delivered on the promise of connecting my garage door opener with the house lights. The three scenes were easy to program and set up. If you’re looking for a way to get started with Z-Wave based home control and you want to have the added security of turning on the lights in your house when you pull into the garage, this could be the product for you.

Entering the Z-Wave Zone One Step at a Time

In order to review one product, we ended up installing three and what we found may surprise you.

By Scott A. Lowe
ZWW Reviews Editor
4.4

Wayne-Dalton

Car2U Converter

Key Chain Remote

Wireless Gateway

I have always been enchanted by that car commercial where a homeowner pulls into his driveway, reaches up to the overhead transmitter and with a touch of a button opens the garage door and lights up the house. Finally, I got around to installing the same features in my home only to discover that I not only purchased the wrong house but apparently the wrong car as well. More precisely, the built-in remote control in my car did not communicate with my house and the garage door opener did not communicate with anything. Normally, I would have just given up the idea if it were not for two life-saving Z-Wave devices from Wayne-Dalton, the Lear Car2U garage door converter and the Wireless Gateway Module. To complete my first Z-Wave scenario I also installed two Light Modules (which will be discussed in greater detail in the next installment) and rounded off the project with a Wayne-Dalton Key Chain Remote.

The Wireless Gateway Control by Wayne-Dalton is a programmable control panel with up to three sets of instructions (called "Scenes") that can be activated with a push of a button. That button can be one of the conveniently located device itself or on your Wayne-Dalton Key Chain Remote control. For those who want to go the extra step, Wayne-Dalton also offers the Car2U converter that permits your garage door to be opened from their Key Chain remote.

Overall, the project was certainly easier than installing a water heater or clothes dryer but required some forethought. In fact, planning where the various Z-Wave modules would go and how they might interact opened my mind to the realm of possibilities. Even better, for the price of a microwave you can get started and for the price of a dishwasher you could automate your entire home. It's just a matter of taking the first step.

Keep reading…